Convicted Innocent(4)

Corbin smiled.





Friday



Late April 1887

David Powell fished a few coins out of his pocket, selected a tuppence piece, and traded it with the newsboy for a paper.

It was late morning, the early spring air just warm enough to be comfortable without yet feeling hot. David had finished teaching his morning class only an hour or so ago, and he only taught the one on Fridays. Normally he would be heading for home now, but a few errands begged his attention first.

For one, he needed to drop by his solicitor’s to see if the situation had changed about the property he wanted to buy.

‘Buy’ was perhaps too strong a word…‘acquire’ was more appropriate. He needed to acquire a building to serve as a school for the English language classes he taught, as he was currently working out of borrowed digs. And since the funds he was cobbling together to finance the undertaking were hardly his own (poor clergymen had to rely on others’ benefaction), he would be acquiring premises in the end.

Hopefully.

Having the keys to a building – any building – for the sake of his school would be fantastic. So he needed to meet with his solicitor.

But first he had another errand to run.

…Or was it two? David had a sudden suspicion he was forgetting something as he strode through the noisy bustle that was Commercial Road. No matter. He’d recollect it eventually.

He’d only gone a block or so down the wide thoroughfare when the sight of a mass of people blocking most of the street made him pause.

The mob seemed a peaceable sort, he determined after a moment, and Lord knew they were common enough nowadays. A few beehive-helmeted policemen were keeping the crowd in check to allow street traffic to continue flowing, but they weren’t otherwise interfering.

The protesters seemed to be mostly women. A spark of curiosity almost drove David closer to find out what they were on about. Was it a workers’ movement? A suffrage gathering? The temperance society?

But he desisted, figuring they wouldn’t be vacating that part of the street or pavement any time soon. He could find out after he paid a visit to his friend.

Well, David didn’t suppose he’d actually find his best mate, Lewis Todd, at his flat right then. The chap was a police sergeant, a bobby just like the blokes now patrolling the mob, and he tended to work longer hours than most folk.

In fact, David knew his friend had recently been involved in some arrests that had brought a rather notorious East End crime family to court: the trials were still in full swing. He was sure the paper under his arm shrieked the details of the proceedings in the headlines.

In any case, Lew was probably testifying or waiting to do so even as he thought about it.

A voice hailed David just then, and he paused to speak with the young woman, the wife of one of his students. Elise Marquette had one of her children clutching at her skirts, and the little girl stared up in silent interest at her mother and David as the two conversed.

The Marquettes had only been in London for about six months, but Henri had found steady work at an industrial millinery almost immediately. On account of his lessons with David, though, the Frenchman’s broken English had improved to the point that he’d recently been promoted to shift leader, news which Elise shared with shy delight.

Just after he and Mrs. Marquette parted, someone else caught David’s arm with a greeting and a grin. Another few minutes passed, and when that conversation ended, another followed, then another. David belatedly realized that if he wished to accomplish anything further that morning he would have to be rude or make his way off Commercial.